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12.5% Of Publishers Now Join via Emails. How Admitad Partner Network Automated Communications with Webmasters
Admitad Partner Network helps top-tier brands like AliExpress, Lenovo, and EGO increase their sales and traffic by collaborating with publishers (content creators, marketers, cashback services and other platforms with a significant audience).
Company size.
30 thousand advertisers
1 million webmasters
1 million webmasters
Challenges
Increase webmaster registration conversion
Increase revenue from webmaster commission
Make it easier for managers to work with new application
Increase revenue from webmaster commission
Make it easier for managers to work with new application
Solutions
Launched an onboarding email series
Launched segmented emails for webmasters
Set up pop-ups for applications with automatic manager notifications and developed a unique customer segmentation for each business, so that everyone can receive personalized content
Launched segmented emails for webmasters
Set up pop-ups for applications with automatic manager notifications and developed a unique customer segmentation for each business, so that everyone can receive personalized content
Results
The company assesses the effectiveness of emails by the number of webmaster connections made to the advertiser’s offer. This indicator is measured in joins:12.5% share of total joins received from the email channel31,8% share of total joins received by connecting the email channel
Integrated with:
Website
Admitad Partner Network is a platform that brings together advertisers and webmasters (marketers and bloggers). For example, if an online store needs to increase traffic, it posts an offer in Admitad Affiliate. The webmaster accepts the offer, receives an affiliate link to the online store, and posts it on their blog. In turn, their audience follows the link and makes purchases in the online store. By doing this, the webmaster receives a share of sales and Admitad Affiliate Network gets a commission.
Therefore, it is important for the service that webmasters register, connect to advertisers’ offers, and generate traffic and sales. To achieve this, we:
- Developed an onboarding email series;
- Presented new offers from advertisers in the industry and the webmaster’s region;
- Launched pop-ups to collect applications from webmasters and advertisers with notifications sent to Admitad Partner Network managers.
Results
Most Admitad Partner Network communications aim to get the webmaster to join the advertiser’s offer. This is why the company measures the efficiency of its emails in “joins” — in other words, how many publishers join the offer.
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12.5
% share of total joins received from the email channel. (Last click attribution method, 2021) -
31.8
% share of total joins received by connecting the email channel.
Data from Admitad Partner Network’s internal reporting
12,5% is the average share of total joins received from the email channel
Data from Admitad Partner Network's internal reporting, using the last-click attribution method, 2021
We switched to Maestra because we lacked the capabilities of an up-to-date messenger. We were primarily interested in segmentation and trigger campaigns, but we understood that we would eventually need more opportunities, and we were ready to pay for them.
Features and stability. Maestra is essentially unrivaled in terms of functionality, speed, and stability. It’s great that scripts were added. Now we hardly use triggers anymore. Customizing pop-ups is a pleasant experience. We use a lot of features and need to edit code. The Maestra platform adapts well to our needs.
Interface. The interface is complicated. It would be great to send all new users a guide helping them learn how to use the platform. Unfortunately, I had to figure it out myself.
Chatbots. Another disadvantage is chatbots. This involves trivial things like not being able to change the formatting of the text (e.g., making it bold or embedding a link). There have also been times when triggers have not been activated. However, the main thing is that the chatbot cannot be trained. We would like it to recognize questions and suggest answers itself. However, Maestra has no such functionality so far in the pipeline. Perhaps we will disable this module and look for another service for chatbots.
Support service. Maestra offers great support. They are spurring on the developers themselves, clearly explaining what to do and how to do it. I haven’t seen such a service before. I was impressed that the guys are working ahead of the curve. They warn us about possible problems in advance or remind us of tasks when we need to update a status. I’ve not come across such a great service!
How the email onboarding for webmasters works
Onboarding helps new webmasters start earning with Admitad Partner Network. It is based on the funnel they go through when they start working with an affiliate network:
- Registration;
- Adding a platform (Instagram, TikTok, or another network);
- Connecting to the advertiser’s affiliate program;
- Getting the first click on an affiliate link;
- The first confirmed sale.
The purpose of each email of the onboarding sequence is to help the webmaster move on to the next stage. At the same time, the emails take into account the webmaster’s actions. For example, a webmaster registered, received the first four emails that taught them how to add a website, but didn’t add it. The fourth email will then be repeated once a month until the webmaster moves on to the next step, unsubscribes, or until six months have passed.
The first onboarding email
Sent as soon as the webmaster registers:
Sent as soon as the webmaster registers:
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Open rate40.5%
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Click rate7.1%
The second onboarding email
Sent every other day if the webmaster has not added a platform or the previous email has not been delivered:
Sent every other day if the webmaster has not added a platform or the previous email has not been delivered:
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Open rate45.4%
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Click rate7.2%
The third onboarding email
Sent in two days if the webmaster has not added a platform or the previous email has not been delivered:
Sent in two days if the webmaster has not added a platform or the previous email has not been delivered:
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Open rate27.1%
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Click rate4.2%
The fourth onboarding email
Sent in a month and resends in another six months, until the webmaster unsubscribes or goes on to the next step:
Sent in a month and resends in another six months, until the webmaster unsubscribes or goes on to the next step:
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Open rate21.4%
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Click rate3%
More recently, another stage was added to the email chain — when the webmaster receives the first minimum amount that can be withdrawn. So far, we’ve only added one email for this stage but we plan on further developing the chain.
Since Admitad Partner Network operates in ten countries and sends communications in different languages, the onboarding chain is different for each country. In the most promising language segments, it consists of seventeen emails, whereas in less developed ones, it consists of five emails, with one email for each stage of the funnel.
We have been using Maestra to send out manual campaigns for three years now but we only started making an automated onboarding workflow about a year and a half ago. The difficulty is that any IT issue takes a very long time and is expensive to implement in a big company.
When it came to onboarding, we lacked data on the webmaster’s activities in the system. For example, the webmaster first earned the minimum amount for withdrawal, yet Maestra did not receive data about this until 36 hours later. By April, our IT specialists had fixed this problem.
It was also necessary to send and store the webmaster’s information, their platform, and the referrer they connected to all in Maestra. Due to our IT department’s heavy workload, this around took 8-9 months to implement.
On June 11, 2021, we launched the first version of the onboarding for publishers was launched. However, in September, integration broke down on our side, and it took a month to fix the situation. It wasn’t until October that everything started working well.
How to segment bulk email recipients
Admitad Partner Network sends 12-20 manual mailings per week with the help of two marketers:
- Digests with affiliate marketing trends, successful cases in e-commerce and other segments;
- Mailings about new advertisers;
- Promotional mailings with advertisers’ offers;
- Newsletters about marathons and festivals (i.e., periods with more favorable conditions);
- Content emails from the Admitad Academy.
Since switching to Maestra, Admitad Partner Network has not sent a single campaign to its entire audience. Web and data analysts made uploads and analyzed data — for example, to learn how to distinguish webmasters who work only in a specific industry or have a certain type of platform. That is, the analysts could not say for sure whether the webmaster was selling via YouTube or Instagram. However, they could determine that the webmaster was selling through social media, not through contextual advertising.
Now that Maestra has data about the platform and the webmaster’s offers, we are building segments based on them.
Based on interest in emails. Content emails take into account whether the webmaster has read previous emails. This helps avoid annoying all the subscribers who are not interested in content with news and digests.
Weekly Digest
Sent to webmasters who have subscribed to news emails and have opened them in the last three months:
Sent to webmasters who have subscribed to news emails and have opened them in the last three months:
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Open rate33.3%
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Click rate1.6%
Admitad Academy email
Sent to webmasters who have subscribed to news emails and opened newsletters over the past two months:
Sent to webmasters who have subscribed to news emails and opened newsletters over the past two months:
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Open rate21.4%
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Click rate0.4%
Based on region and language. Admitad Partner Network works with clients from many countries around the world, including the USA, India, Germany, and Poland. Therefore, webmasters are also segmented by region and language.
Email about new partner programs
This was sent to webmasters in the USA and the UK who added a platform, accepted offers ands opened Admitad Affiliate campaigns for the last three months:
This was sent to webmasters in the USA and the UK who added a platform, accepted offers ands opened Admitad Affiliate campaigns for the last three months:
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Open rate36.3%
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Click rate1.9%
Email about new partner programs
This was sent to webmasters in India who signed up for new affiliate programs:
This was sent to webmasters in India who signed up for new affiliate programs:
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Open rate16.3%
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Click rate0.9%
It is interesting to compare the indicators of the same type of campaigns among audiences from different countries. For example, the Open rate — of emails among the English-speaking audience is 4 times higher than other audiences.
We attribute this to the fact that GDPR is stricter in the U.S. and Europe, so the companies and the audience have a slightly different attitude to email lists. People are a little less willing to subscribe to emails. However, if they leave a contact, they are more likely to regularly read the content.
By industry. In order to increase webmaster activity, they are invited to participate in marathons and festivals, which are periods with more favorable conditions. Sometimes advertisers themselves order campaigns advertising their offers in order to attract more webmasters. To avoid spamming subscribers, they are segmented by the industry they work with. For instance, if a webmaster works with games and software, they will not be sent an offer from a travel company.
Promotional mailing for a family clothing brand
Sent to webmasters who work with clothes and children’s goods:
Sent to webmasters who work with clothes and children’s goods:
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Open rate21.8%
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Click rate1%
Promotional mailing for an information security service
Sent to webmasters who work with Internet services:
Sent to webmasters who work with Internet services:
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Open rate24.1%
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Click rate1.4%
Based on activity on the platform. Admitad Partner Network tests the reactivation of webmasters from time to time. Perhaps, over time, they will automate this type of email campaign.
An email asking for feedback
This is sent to active webmasters who have not made an affiliate link click for a long time
This is sent to active webmasters who have not made an affiliate link click for a long time
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Open rate20.6%
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Click rate2.2%
How we simplified the work with applications for managers
Admitad Partner Network has many landing pages for different audiences of advertisers and webmasters. When a visitor clicks on the button, a pop-up with a registration form will appear. Once filled in, the data will go straight into Maestra.
We use pop-ups on our landing pages for contact collection and special events. For example, we sometimes hold marathons where webmasters compete and prizes are awarded to the winners. For us to start counting their points, they must register on a special page. As another example, a potential advertiser reads about the Admitad Affiliate network and leaves contact information.
Maestra makes this more convenient because managers do not need to monitor application appearances manually. When an advertiser leaves a request, they immediately receive confirmation that it has been accepted and that they will be contacted soon. Similarly, the manager receives an email regarding the new application. It contains the advertiser’s name, email address, and UTM tags so that it is clear which channel the advertiser came from.
Pop-up on the landing page for advertisers
Marketing development plans
- Use pop-ups to onboard webmasters. Unlike email campaigns, the pop-up appears in the personal account just when the webmaster is working on the system and ready to receive information about it. At the same time, it cannot be skipped or disabled, like campaigns via an email channel. That’s why Admitad Affiliate is now developing pop-ups for webmaster onboarding. The plan is to make onboarding in the personal account available in English and German to start.
- Launch pop-ups with advertiser offers for active webmasters.
- Refine the onboarding sequence to make it more personalized. For example, it’s important to consider the type of platform. If the webmaster has connected an Instagram account, then they receive emails regarding Instagram. It’s also crucial to take into account which types of advertisers’ offers the webmaster connects to: e-commerce, finance, Internet services, games, mobile apps, or tourist offers.
- Send transactional messages via Maestra. At the moment, transactional messages are sent through the admin panel of the platform. However, the layouts are outdated and don’t adapt well to the size of the screen. Sending them via Maestra will not only improve the emails but will also be useful to the sender’s domain because transactional emails usually have good indicators, which will increase the trust of campaign services.
- Try recommendations in emails and on the website. To begin with, Amitad plan to show similar offers on the offer page.